Goals for the New Year

Victor Truong

After yet another 366 days, it is finally another year. Hopefully this year, with the help of my friends and family, I can climb yet another mountain. But first and foremost, I need to get all my goals out of my head and into writing. A few of them are:

Get comfortable with public speaking. I've noticed improvement in this area over the past year, but still, the problem hasn't gone away entirely yet. I still studder (a lot) here and there.

Develop at least three new software applications. They can be something as simple as a bi-directional chatting application to a full-fledged social network. My next project will be a lot more ambitious than my previous one. I'm planning to continue practicing Node.js with all upcoming projects.

Be a little more active physically. This means spending less time in front of any electronic device (e.g. computer, phone, etc.), and doing something small like going out for a walk or going to the local pool and swimming a few laps. Not exercising has been the main cause of my increased feelings of laziness and decreased motivation to do things. I can't think as hard as I used to, and I'm having trouble performing simple memorization tasks. I might need to start working out soon (I don't even lift, too busy making apps), I'm really behind compared to other guys the same age as me when it comes to personal fitness.

Learn one new programming language.Ruby, Go, and C are the few potential candidates as of right now. Ruby is another language that can be used for web development, so I want to learn that so if I run into it in any projects, I'll be able to interpret what it does. Google's Go is a relatively new language, and it's been getting more and more popular among developers. C is a language for working with lower-level things, and ultimately gives you control of things closer to the physical hardware. That will come in handy if I ever decide to get involved in any sort of activity that involves robotics.

Learn how to build a computer from scratch. I'm more of a software kind of guy, but to truly know computers, I must have knowledge of both the software side and hardware side of it. I found myself feeling embarrassed awhile back when I heard a discussion containing lingo I did not know yet, such as BIOS, cores, and SSD. I've learned a bit more about hardware, but I have a long way to go before I am actually knowledgeable.